ePublisher Guide

Note that this guide was last updated in 2004. It contains tons of useful advice for new publishers so we continue to offer it.

The definitive guide to electronic publishing for the RPG/Game Industry.

With over 80 pages packed (no art) of information on how to startup and run your new business from many well known names in the industry. Detailed information on how to be successfully budget, market, create, and sell your product as an ePublishing. Tons of tips and trick to help you along the way as well as recomendations for getting it right the first time.

Access to our private forum of e-Publishers to share information with other publishers and future publishers

Also includes a primer article about the PDF industry

and more..

PREFACE / FORWARD

Forward from Monte Cook

PREPRESS & PLANNING

Best selling topics

Love of it

Do the research

Format

Content & Page Counts

BUDGETS AND STAFF

Budgeting

Product Pricing

Expected Costs

Funding

Editing

The Staff

Freelancers

Royalties vs Flat Fees

LEGAL

Your Company

Copyrights & Trademarks

Taxes

LICENSING

Using open gaming licenses

D20 System and WotC OGL License

Licensing a brand

Obtaining commercial licenses

DESIGN AND LAYOUT

Choosing a Title

Cover Art

Interior Art

Review of Publishing Software

Creating the PDF

Table of Contents

Bookmarks and comments

Columns, Fonts, Tables, Art and maps

Full Bleed

Indices

MARKETING

Your website and Demo

The art of pre-press hype

Reviews & Comments

Online Ads

Per-per-click Search Engines

Advertising Tips

Print Ads

Conventions

Forums & Community

Directories, Top Sites, WebRings

Banner Exchanges

News Releases

Specials

e-Malls

CD Sales

Freebies

e-zines

UseNet Posting

Deleting Stock

Teaming with Publishers & Branding

RPGNow Specifics

SALES

Pre-Orders

Potential Sales

Processing

Release schedules

Life cycle of a PDF vs Print

RESOURCES

Publisher Forums

Mail Lists & Yahoo Groups

Layout/Design Forums

Freelance Resources

CD, POD & Print Publishing

Free/Open Game Systems

Directories

Review Sites

News Sites & Submission Links

D20 System Links

Internet Marketing Tools

Major Conventions

Associations

Hosting and Forums Services

Other Primers and Helpful Articles

Interesting Message Threads

SURVEY

Customer Survey Results

EXTRAS

Excell Spread Sheet

Contract Templates

ePrimer

Distressed Design

NOTE: Majority of information in this documents are useful for non-d20 and even print publishers.

"...it's GREAT! I'm especially appreciative of some of the crunchy data bits that are spread throughout -- graphs, solid sales figures on different product categories, etc. This is something of significant use to me as an established print publisher, and it would be a godsend for someone just starting out, PDF or otherwise." - John Nephew - Atlas Games

"I've been looking at it, and if I'd had the opportunity to do so two years ago, I would have paid $50 for this product without flinching. It's great... you should get it. No question. Even if you want to publish print products, there's a lot in here you can use (budgeting, incorporating, layout advice, sample contracts... the list goes on). - Monte Cook

Back in 2004 when the D20 system was still booming and the Open Game License was encouraging publishers to experiment with their own compatible systems, it seemed anyone could be a PDF publisher. This book goes beyond being a RPG PDF publisher and is [...]

A vital resource for anyone who wishes to publish electronically.<br><br>
<b>LIKED</b>: Substantial information on epublishing processes and concerns.<br><br><b>DISLIKED</b>: It needed a stronger alignmen [...]

This should be mandatory reading for anyone wanting to start in pdf publishing. There's a lot of good advice on a wide range of subjects. There will be something you didn't think of that's covered here and worth your money to know it.<br><br [...]

This is a useful resource for those thinking of getting into the PDF business or looking to study it. <br><br><b>LIKED</b>: The contracts and other documents were quite useful and as informative about the pdf business as the tex [...]

These products were created by scanning an original printed edition. Most older books are in scanned image format because original digital layout files never existed or were no longer available from the publisher.

For PDF download editions, each page has been run through Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software to attempt to decipher the printed text. The result of this OCR process is placed invisibly behind the picture of each scanned page, to allow for text searching. However, any text in a given book set on a graphical background or in handwritten fonts would most likely not be picked up by the OCR software, and is therefore not searchable. Also, a few larger books may be resampled to fit into the system, and may not have this searchable text background.

For printed books, we have performed high-resolution scans of an original hardcopy of the book. We essentially digitally re-master the book. Unfortunately, the resulting quality of these books is not as high. It's the problem of making a copy of a copy. The text is fine for reading, but illustration work starts to run dark, pixellating and/or losing shades of grey. Moiré patterns may develop in photos. We mark clearly which print titles come from scanned image books so that you can make an informed purchase decision about the quality of what you will receive.

Original electronic format

These ebooks were created from the original electronic layout files, and therefore are fully text searchable. Also, their file size tends to be smaller than scanned image books. Most newer books are in the original electronic format. Both download and print editions of such books should be high quality.